Limits to Growth: How Bad Taxes are Crowding Out Reforms to Promote Work, Investment, and Prosperity
Roundtable Luncheon with William B.P. Robson, Heather Evans & Shawn Porter
C.D. Howe Institute events and webinars are open to members and their guests.
Please follow this link or contact events@cdhowe.org to register.
William B.P. Robson, Chief Executive Officer, C.D. Howe Institute
Bill Robson took office as CEO of the C.D. Howe Institute in July 2006, after serving as the Institute’s Senior Vice President since 2003 and Director of Research from 2000 to 2003. He has written more than 260 monographs, articles, chapters and books on such subjects as government budgets, pensions, healthcare financing, inflation and currency issues. His work has won awards from the Policy Research Secretariat, the Canadian Economics Association, and the Donner Canadian Foundation. He is a Senior Fellow at Massey College and holds an ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors. He is a member of the Panel of Senior Advisors to the Auditor General of Ontario and the Ifo World Economic Survey expert group, and a regular commentator on BNN/Bloomberg. Bill taught undergraduate public finance and public policy at the University of Toronto from 2000 to 2003, and a Master’s level course in public finance at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy from 2014 to 2019.
Heather Evans, LL.B, LL.M, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Tax Foundation
Heather Evans, BA, LLB, LLM (Taxation) is Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Canadian Tax Foundation. Called to the Ontario Bar, she practised tax law for several years prior to joining Deloitte Canada, where she was admitted to the partnership in 2000 and served as National Managing Partner, Tax, from 2012 to 2016. Heather is a member of the Law Society of Ontario, the Canadian Tax Foundation, the International Fiscal Association, the Ontario Bar Association, and the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners. She serves on several corporate and non-profit boards and has also enjoyed teaching as adjunct faculty at Western University, Osgoode Hall Law School and the University of Toronto.
Shawn Porter, CPA, CA, Partner, National Tax Office, Deloitte
Shawn is a partner in the Toronto office of Deloitte where he practices in the areas of international tax and mergers and acquisitions. He has advised Canadian and foreign based multinationals and institutional investors on corporate and international tax planning matters for over 30 years. He has extensive experience in structuring the ownership and financing of domestic and international investments by strategic investors and investment funds (eg., private equity, credit, and infrastructure) in a variety of co-investor arrangements involving partnerships and other special purpose vehicles.
Shawn is a former instructor of international tax in the University of Waterloo’s Master of Taxation Program and a lecturer in Advanced International Tax for CPA Canada. He has addressed the Canadian Tax Foundation, the International Fiscal Association, and the Tax Executives Institute, among other organizations, and has written on a variety of subjects including Canada’s tax treaties, the tax and accounting aspects of derivatives, foreign exchange and treasury operations, BEPS related matters, form and substance in tax law, domestic and international tax policy, transactions of interest, and the General Anti-avoidance Rule.
Shawn served as Associate Assistant Deputy Minister in the Tax Policy Branch (Department of Finance) from 2020 until 2023 and was Canada’s representative on the OECD’s Committee of Fiscal Affairs as well as a member of the CFA Bureau and Steering Group of the Inclusive Framework. He had previously served as the Director of the Tax Legislation Division in the Tax Policy Branch (Department of Finance) from 2011 to 2013. He is a former Chair of the Canadian Tax Foundation and has served as a Council Member of the International Fiscal Association (Canadian Branch) and a member of the Joint Committee on Taxation of the Canadian Bar Association and CPA Canada. Shawn received a Lifetime Contribution Award from the Canadian Tax Foundation in 2020. He is also active in the Waterloo Centre for Taxation in a Global Economy.
Shawn graduated from the University of Waterloo with a Bachelor of Arts degree and a Master of Accounting degree and he is a CPA.
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